First Cut
by whatsthefracas
Summary: Her blood tasted like the rusty blade, but his tongue traced the line of her finger with terrifying devotion. He had loved her. She was his. An episode in Eric's past.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: Never thought my authorship would take me here. This is my darkest story yet.

* * *

Eric pursued the unescorted woman through the dark alleys of the Jewish Quarter with quiet speed. She turned the last corner towards the household of her employers as Eric cut down a shorter street as he had practiced. He waited in the shadows for her beside the stairs he had staked out for weeks, attending the moment when he could take her easily.

Not even a glint of moonlight on his fangs would give him away. His prey was lost in thought. He counted on this. She let out a huff of steam at the sight of the dark window on the third floor, her home, isolated from the warmth of the fire in the main hall, the frigid corner where her cramped arm and numb hand spent long days scratching rows of ink. It was to her good fortune that she could so deftly copy handwriting, her mother had told her when she abandoned her to the company of Josef Ganz and Son.

"What does it matter that you do not know the words?" her mother replied when she claimed her illiteracy should keep her from taking the job. "Be grateful, Vera."

She never heard from her mother afterwards. The family had moved east. They had disposed of their eldest daughter, unmarriageable and frightening, and fled from the disgrace, comforted by the knowledge that she would be kept alive at least in the house of Ganz. Vera despised them them all, her family and benefactors.

Welled up with hatred, Vera scuffed her feet along the bricks lining the last steps to the front door. She hesitated. Eric waited for her to reach into the deep pocket of her overcoat for the key. Instead, she stood still and frowned as though she had forgotten something. Tottering with hunger, Eric emerged carelessly into the triangle of light below the window.

Vera gasped. He grabbed her sooner than he meant to and whisked along the side of the house out into the wider avenues of the city of Prague to the cellar where he lived. He bolted the door behind him and threw her in the straw beside the black box, a stolen coffin, he called his bed.

"Make a noise and I will kill you now," he threatened, his fangs gleaming.

Vera hardly flinched.

"Of course, I would rather take my time," Eric purred. "I have been hunting you for awhile. I want to be satisfied."

He ran a finger along the length of her jaw.

Vera remained silent.

"That's good," he said and bent to kiss her neck. "This will not hurt. Very much."

Vera bit her lip to stifle a scream as Eric took a long draught of blood. He pulled away as she was about to faint.

"Don't do that."

Cradling her head and lapping at his chin, he tried to glamour her to stay conscious.

"You want to be awake," he whispered, though her eyes closed and she went limp. He let her drop. There was no thrill in drinking blood from a resting heart. It had to beat with fear, pumping and gushing till he could choke from the flow.

Eric lit a candle, pulled a book from the pile in the corner, and whiled away the night in disappointment. Shortly before dawn, Vera awoke.

Eric yawned.

"Well, well. Too late now. We will just have to wait until this evening. Are you going to try to escape or can I leave you here unbound?"

"What better place could I go," Vera murmured, taking in her surroundings.

Eric was intrigued by her tone.

"You are not afraid?" he asked. "It will be very dark and lonely as you anticipate the vile things I may do to you."

He crouched closer to her and grinned.

"But if you're good…" he added.

She nodded submissively.

"All the same," Eric said and laced a chain around her ankles.

"And what _will_ you do to me?" Vera ventured.

In an instant his lips were on hers, prying them into a predatory kiss. He intended to leave her breathless and weakened. He waited for her to swoon as simply as she had before. Instead, she pushed against his chest with unexpected force.

Eric smiled.

"Oh good, you _are_ going to fight. Now stay put until the sun goes down."

Vera watched him climb into the box and replace the lid. Any other woman would have cried.


	2. Chapter 2

Vera spent the hours of her captivity wondering if this was the Lord's punishment she was promised. Before her family left, before she lived with old man Ganz, she had been betrothed to a man of little imagination but sound wealth. When he learned of the black moods that descended upon her, the fits of rage, the crying spells, the deathly periods of silence, he explained politely that he was no longer interested. Vera's parents were desperate for the marriage and offered him their younger daughter instead. They were happily wed the next spring.

Her parents very nearly suffered a great humiliation and they made certain Vera knew she was at fault.

"It is some evil possession" was her mother's favorite way to describe Vera's disruptive condition. "God will not look kindly on you for harboring the devil. You must at least _try _to rid yourself of it."

The truth was Vera suffered inwardly much more than anyone around her could suspect. The outward manifestation of madness that brewed in her soul was nothing but an unfocused cry of release. What really dwelled within her was so tangled, so sorrowful, so shattered and painful that she looked upon every moment with hopelessness. Life held nothing for her. She had not yet worked up the courage to leave it all behind. She knew it was a sin, but God was far from her, lacking in comfort, empty of solace. She no longer feared God because she no longer loved him.

Should this monster, she thought, have it in mind to kill me, I would be grateful. It thrilled her to be able to let that dark thought escape. As dusk glazed over the rooftops of Prague, unseen in the lightless cellar, Vera found joy in the idea that it might all be over more painlessly than she had planned.

The coffin lid creaked open. Eric sat up and stretched his arms wide.

"Hello," Vera said weakly.

"No tears of fright?" Eric asked, disappointed.

"I can cry if you like."

"Thank you, but it's not necessary," he replied, taking a greater interest in the girl's peculiar response.

He stepped out into the rest of the room, ducking his head under the low ceiling. He sat down again in front of her.

"Now, where should we start?"

He examined the marks on her neck from the night before and ran his hands down her arms to hold out her frail wrists.

"Tiny," he noted.

He dropped her hands and began to undo the chain at her ankles. Vera hugged her knees to her chest automatically.

Eric grabbed her foot, pulled the right leg free, and smoothed his hand up her thigh. She trembled. Without a word of warning he sunk his teeth into the pale skin in the crook of her leg. She tried to wriggle free, but he pressed his hand on her stomach to hold her still. She whimpered as his tongue and lips moved over the opening he had made. She closed her eyes with panicked thrill. The agony of the moment rippled through her. And suddenly she felt as though she were falling. The image of Eric's red-stained lips on her skin slipped away. Vertiginous, she gazed down at the family doctor.

"We're going to bleed you now. You must be drained of the melancholia."

Vera screamed.

Eric lifted his head. Wiping his face with the back of his hand, he moved it to cup over her mouth. She gagged on the salty flavor of her own blood.

"Quiet," he commanded.

Vera began to sob.

Eric smiled. He loved his victims to be distressed.

"Can you be quieter?" he asked.

She didn't offer him a reply. He kissed the soft area under her chin.

"Please?" he asked again.

She nodded and he moved down to her leg once more.

"Do it quickly," she whispered.

Eric cocked his eyebrow in surprise.

"Do what exactly?"

Vera was silent.

"This?" he asked and licked the wound on her leg. She twitched.

"This?" he asked again, kissing the wound.

She still did not say a word.

"This?" he asked, his voice more ragged.

He sucked hard and held the blood his mouth, swirling it around his palate like the finest of red wines. He swallowed and turned to look her in the eyes.

"Or this?" he said finally, easing on top of her, pressing against her through their clothes.

Vera inhaled sharply. She closed her eyes.

"Tell me you want it," he coaxed.

Tears escaped her tightly clenched eyes.

Eric sighed. He sat back on his haunches.

"I'm not going to do it," he remarked with disdain.

Vera broke into gasps of relief.

Deflated, Eric moved over to a crate up against the wall and began sifting through a variety of evening wear.

Vera pulled herself up and wiped her face, still trying to catch her breath.

"W-why?" she stuttered.

"Well, for one thing, I don't have time. To do it justice for you, my virgin," he added. "There's a gala I need to get to. Now, tell me, what do you think of the blue scarf?"

"You are going to a gala?" Vera wondered with bewilderment.

"As if I'd spend my time in this hole. I am entertaining a certain business venture at the moment. So, yes, I am going to a gala."

He buttoned up a clean shirt.

Vera's tentative grasp of the situation was completely gone. She could not anticipate the motives of her captor, now donning for a ball. What did he mean for her to do while he was gone? Was he finished with her?

She asked him.

"Sorry my darling," he replied. "You are just too delicious."

"Delicious?" she repeated.

He smacked his lips in appreciation.

"I'm starving," she grumbled.

"Oh human girl, I will bring something back for you."

"Then I am to stay here? For how long?"

A smile curled on Eric's face as though he suddenly had a brilliant idea.

He struck a match and lit a hunk of wax that barely resembled a candle. He held it close to Vera's face.

"Beautiful. As I thought. Very beautiful."

Vera returned his gaze steadily.

"I think I can find you a gown. And slippers. Not certain what to do about your hair."

He seemed merely to be thinking aloud rather than directly addressing her.

Vera questioned again, "How long will you hold me like this?"

"Like this? Not long. You will be drained in a matter of days. If I try not to be a glutton."

He winked.

Vera grew angry.

"Just do it _now," _she said desperately.

"Do you have a death wish, girl?"

Vera blushed.

"Because I can satisfy that immediately."

He pounced on her and menaced his fangs.

Vera turned her face away and stretched her neck out for him.

He burst out laughing.

"What a strange creature," he said to himself, amused. He continued his fastidious preparations for going out on the town without casting another look at her.

When he seemed ready to leave, he reached down and took her hand.

"I have decided I would _very _much love for you to attend."

Vera replied automatically, "Please no," but Eric hardly listened.

She was surprised by how much lighter it was on the street level. The moon was out, the lamps were lit. She had never been so happy to see the nighttime.

"If I recall, there is a ladies' shop off Wenceslas Square. Shall we?"

He slid his arm through hers and led her quickly in the direction he intended. With stealth, he broke down the back door. Vera wondered at his strength. They both entered the dark shop. Eric tore a dress off a work-table in the back room and held it up to her.

"Put it on," he commanded.

Vera complied, though she could barely see how in the darkness. Eric deftly did up the back without her request. She could not feel his fingers working, but within moments, her hair was piled atop her head with pins.

"My face must be dirty," she said meekly, marveling at her reflection in the mirror. Never had she worn such a fine gown. Or been dressed so effortlessly.

"Nonsense, you look perfect. How do you feel?"

"Weak," Vera admitted.

"Pretty little prey, you shouldfeel weak. But we'll get some wine into you _tout de suite_."

Confused, exhausted, slightly in pain, increasingly suspicious, yet utterly helpless, Vera followed Eric out of the shop and onto the wide boulevard.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: Just to clarify, this story is set in the late 19th Century in Prague.

* * *

While they were walking, Vera thought of a hundred different things to ask him, but balked each time she tried to speak.

She was startled when Eric's voice suddenly broke the silence.

"With any other woman, I would worry," he said thoughtfully. "They would scream the minute we arrived at the party. They would tell people what I had done, show the marks, set a mob after me. But not you."

He looked her straight in the eye.

"Right?" he asked, gripping her arm with severity.

Vera shook her head. She would not expose him for whatever kind of creature he was. She told herself that she had little interest in his strange existence. With haste, he would be granting her final liberty. There was no need then to be concerned with comprehension of his bloodthirsty ways.

Yet she was still curious of his dark power.

"Will you answer one question?" she posed with courage.

"Gladly."

"You _can_ give me death?" she said, her voice rising at the end.

"Beautiful martyr, I can give you eternal life," Eric replied exuberantly, losing the meaning of her words.

Vera was silent. An infinite span of her pained solitude sounded like God's true punishment. She suspected that it was the only just response to the mortal sin of her madness. Eternal life on earth would be her utter damnation.

She shivered.

"Forever is a wonderfully long time to be alive," Eric added, wrapping his arm around her shoulders to warm her. She perceived no effect. He was stone cold.

He gave her a scrutinizing look. He began to like the idea of being her maker. And what an extraordinary companion she would be. The pretty flush on her cheeks would fade, but her features would never grow less lovely. He found her small stature particularly inviting. He could be her protector and lord. She would be loyal.

"Of course you would have to forfeit your soul. Did your nursemaid never tell you stories about me? I am a servant of the Evil One. Here to lead you to perdition."

He flashed his fangs.

Vera gazed on him with inquisitive, yet defiant eyes. He laughed.

"And still you are not breaking away, running off screaming. Perhaps I should be scared of _you_," he said, cornering her against the gate of a palatial residence.

There were sounds of a party coming from the glowing windows.

Without warning, he kissed her, grabbing her hair tight, and slamming her against the metal bars.

"I find you irresistible," he whispered with longing.

Vera winced. A slow ache had crept over her since Eric had bitten her. The abruptness of his passionate display sent shooting pain down her back.

She thought she saw disappointment on his face when he pulled away. He could take her however he liked at any moment, why should her silent rejection displease him?

"We're here," he mumbled and undid the latch on the gate.

As they ascended the staircase into the large, crowded room, Eric turned to her darkly and said, "No wandering, no talking unless addressed, no looking frightened, and absolutely no crying."

Vera was not listening. She had caught sight of the richly laden buffet tables.

She pointed mutely to it.

Eric nodded in approval and as she walked away from him, he seemed to change moods. He greeted an elderly woman with brightness and charm.

"How are you, my dear lady?" he drawled.

The woman flitted her fan more rapidly to conceal a girlish smile. Her husband joined them. Eric shot a glance at Vera who was delighting in a full plate of roast beef. She had never craved the dripping juices of red meat with such frenzy.

"My fiancée will be over in a moment," Eric told the gentleman.

"Fiancee! And here I thought you would always be a satisfied bachelor. This changes my view of you entirely!"

Eric shrugged as if to say that he had been so swept off his feet that he was relinquishing that life's freedom and pleasure.

Vera realized Eric was beckoning her over to him. She set down her plate, sighed, and shuffled through the people to reach him. Once together, he slipped his hand around her waist and introduced her.

"This is—"

He froze in embarrassment. He had not bothered to learn the name of his prey. Now she was his fiancée and he could not introduce her.

"Vera," she interjected, curtseying slightly.

They continued to converse. Eric grew more animated, more persuasive, more powerful. Vera wished she could close her weary eyes and collapse on a sofa, but she stood beside him diligently, clinging to him in her fatigue. It seemed at times that he was having a hypnotic effect on the older couple. Before long, Vera realized that Eric was manipulating the old man and she was somehow a pawn in it. This struck at her pride and would have upset her if she did not place such hope in Eric's power to return of the favor.

"Let us have a smoke. Ladies, I hope you don't mind?" the gentleman said.

His wife waved them away.

Once out of earshot, the man asked Eric, "How did you find such an enchanting creature?"

"By chance. You could say I captured her. Heart, I mean."

Eric found the man's ignorance amusing.

"Well, I am burning with envy," the gentleman continued. "What say you to adding her to the deal?"

They shared a laugh.

"You know, I was suspicious of you before," the gentleman said, suddenly serious. "But that exquisite girl. . . I don't know. She looked absolutely dependent on you. Absolutely adoring. Something tells me that if she trusts you, I should. You can have the money. And more. I'll have my lawyer draw up the paperwork first thing tomorrow."

The man hardly noticed Eric's chilling grasp as they shook hands. He was completely won over.

Buoyed by his expectant financial reward, Eric snaked his way through the waltzing couples to find Vera, her head on a harpsichord in the corner, fading in and out of sleep.

He coaxed her to stand and ushered her away from the guests.

"Well?" she said groggily.

He kissed her.

Forehead pressed to hers, he professed, "I am _never _letting you go. Strange, strange human. You are mine. You _must_ be."


	4. Chapter 4

A/N: I used to be so casual about my updates for Robin Hood. I'd hammer them out and post immediately. I spent a very long time on this, in comparison. I hope it doesn't disappoint.

* * *

Before the night was over, Eric arranged for a room in the nicest hotel.

"This will have to do until we find a more permanent residence. Now that we finally have the funds," he said, addressing Vera as he would a wife.

He opened the door wide. Vera moaned slightly at the sight of the feather bed.

"Do you feel tired?" he asked.

She nodded.

"Weak?"

"Yes, very."

Eric bit down on his thumb. He extended it towards her. A drop of blood pooled on the skin.

Vera naturally drew back.

He held her still by the arm and pressed his thumb to her lips.

She took the droplet on her tongue as he demanded. Dizzy, then suddenly excited, she sucked more blood. He replaced his thumb with his mouth.

Vera threw her arms around his neck and kissed him openly. She clawed at his shirt buttons. She stopped, breathless, at his belt.

She squinted her eyes and stumbled backwards as though struck.

"Was that poisoned?"

"In a way," Eric replied.

Vera gathered her fuzzy wits, clenching and unclenching her hands into fists.

"It's very. . . strange. I feel. . ._alive_."

Eric embraced her again.

"All this time, bound by the blood, the torment," she began raving. "And here, now, with you, life! Life! Blood! As I have never felt it."

Eric tore at her gown.

"Give me more," she begged.

"Not of my blood," he replied, effortlessly rending her dress, cocking his head as the pieces fell to the floor and he took in her naked form.

"If not that, then give me you. All of you."

Eric had never captivated a woman so thoroughly with so little of his blood and no use at all of mesmerizing glamour. Her desire was stronger for him than even a vampire would have for her maker.

He shuddered with pleasure.

"Come to the bed," he said and she followed blindly.

He slid his hand around her throat and relished her racing pulse, burying his face in her hair and inhaling deeply.

He ran his hand down to her left breast and she let out a faint noise of fright at the unfamiliarity of his touch. Stroking her nipple he placed his lips on the soft underside. Vera felt the scratch of his teeth, the sharp pain of his bite, and the slow, heady sense of emptiness as he drank from the veins around her heart.

Eric gave a low growl and ran his bloody lips across her stomach. His hands pushed her legs apart. She gasped and with temerity she had not previously known reached down, wrapped her hand around him, and guided him instinctually till with one forceful thrust he broke smoothly into her. Vera convulsed, choking on nothing, unable to exhale while Eric licked the still dripping wound at her breast. She waited for the rhythm of his movements to push her to the destructive end she craved, but as he cried out with finality and slunk away from her, the room started to spin. There was no ecstatic release, only a swirl of shadows, as nightmares danced before her eyes, nipping at her, she screamed. Eric's peaceful, contented voice shushed her lightheartedly.

"We have neighbors," he teased.

He took her in his arms, in satisfied communion yet she struggled to break free, shrieking. In terror, she fell from the bed and scrambled to the window. It would not open. She pounded on the glass and it shattered in her hands. She gripped the shards, clambering to go out on the ledge.

Eric was beside her in an imperceptible instant. He lifted her and carried her back into the room.

"Kill me," she pleaded. "Make it end."

He could think of nothing to calm her, but to drain her further. This time he bit her wrist. The longer he drew from her, the quieter she became. Afraid of killing her, he let go, though she still trembled. It was nearly dawn. Stunned, Eric pulled the blood-stained sheets off the bed and wrapped her in them. He climbed out the window she had broken and plunged into the blue lightness of the end of night.

***

When Eric emerged the next evening, Vera was still limp where he had left her. He stepped out of the cellar, stretching his legs on the street. He pulled the collar of his coat up and stalked towards his favorite back alleyway behind the workman's bar.

He returned to Vera drunk on brandy-laced blood. Her eyes fluttered open at the sound of his heavy steps.

Eric would have disposed of her in the Vltava River if he was not so stirred by her. He did not like the insecurity of uncertainty and she more than perplexed him. He could not understand how such a frail human who should have evoked nothing but fleeting curiosity and the lust of thirst could instead awake a feeling of almost adoration in him.

Vera tried to speak but her mouth was dry. She crawled over to Eric.

He stiffened, unsure of her motive for finally moving.

She pulled herself up to his chest and hid her face in his shirt. Eric relaxed and stroked her hair.

"Morbid little fairy," he whispered.

Vera looked up at him, blinked tears out of her eyes, and delicately kissed his lips.

"And last night?" he asked in response to her surprising silent exchange.

She seemed lost. She looked down at the lacerations on her hands as if she could not remember how they happened.

"You needn't have my blood again," he said.

She gave him a weak smile.

"Something haunts you," he stated.

Her face grew dark.

"Something worse than _me_," he said, trying to make her smile.

"You will be my savior," she replied hoarsely.

Eric suddenly understood.

"You expect me to murder you? Still?"

He pushed her away in drunken disgust.

"I would have already done it!" he roared.

"Then why—"

"You _stupid_ human," he spat.

Vera held her head in her hands. She collapsed into memories. They tangled around her.

"_Kamila," Vera whispered. "Kamila!"_

"_Another nightmare?" her sister asked sleepily from her side of the bed._

_Vera sniffled and Kamila wrapped her arms around her._

"_Shh. No more grief," she said calmly and began to sing a lullaby._

____  
_

_Vera ran after her father, into the yard where they kept the pig._

"_You cannot kill her! Please, papa!"_

"_She is _food_! Do you want to eat this winter?"_

"_But the piglets!"_

_Kamila and her mother held the squealing sow down while her younger sister jumped in inquisitive excitement. Her father swung the hatchet. Blood splattered on his forearms as he tugged on the blade stuck firmly in the pig's neck. The animal moaned._

_Vera went mute for weeks._

______  
_

"_Kamila is ill. Run along and play with your other sister."_

_The frightening family doctor with his beard like a billy goat ushered Vera out of her own bedroom._

_She heard him hushly tell her mother that she was not to be allowed to sleep there. Kamila was infectious. But every night she tiptoed in and curled under the covers until early one morning Kamila broke out in a suffocating fit of coughing. The sleeves of Vera's nightgown grew sticky and wet as she held Kamila's face, trying to help her to breathe. Her parents flew in._

"_What have you done?" they demanded._

_Vera was thrown out. She crouched by the fire in the main hall and saw her cuffs were stained red. She pulled the nightgown over her head and hurled it in the flames._

_She was not to sleep with Kamila again. Kamila was dead._

_The visions came to her. Kamila's smiling ghost. Then gruesome. Unbearable. Her heart was bound by chains, tightening like a thumbscrew. Vera's mind grew wild. There was no cure. No salvation. Only a life of darkness. A life of horror. She waited for the illness to come to her as her parents threatened. She would die like her sister. She ached for it. _

____

_Her face white as a sheet, she held out her undergarments to her mother. _

"_The blood, mama," she said, in a trance._

_Her mother smacked the side of her head._

"_You foolish girl! How long have you had this?"_

"_I-I don't know, it won't stop," Vera stuttered._

"_Why are you whining like that? It's _supposed_ to happen. About time too."_

_Without an explanation, she went to sleep that night believing it would be her last._

_She attended death as she would her soul's mate. There was nothing in life but a search for death. Only death. Beloved death. _

"How can you want me to kill you?" Eric frantically asked.

Vera shook herself out of the clouded turmoil and saw before her Eric's tall form, prostrate and pleading.

She took his cheek in her hand. Her fingernails were blue, darkness rimmed her eyes, her lips were ashen. Yet Eric believed her the most beautiful woman he could know.

"You can be with me always," he promised. "Always. I will never leave you. Do you understand that? _Never _leave you. Never fade. Never grow indifferent. I will hold you forever. Beyond mortality. Beyond the sorrow of this broken, battered human life. Beyond the eternity of Christian souls. Beyond God's realm. Beyond God. I am beyond God. I will—I will," he faltered.

With gathered courage he finally said, "I will love you longer than God. I will _love_ you."


	5. Chapter 5

A/N: Meant to have this up earlier, but I just started a new job, which I have to run off to now. For those who saw the S2 finale last night, wasn't it sadly lacking in Eric? You know the "I don't love humans" line? Perhaps this story, once finished, will explain it...

* * *

Though his confession of earnest feeling unsettled her, Vera let Eric convince her to move with him out of the cellar and into a spacious townhouse on a fashionable boulevard.

"You certainly cannot return to your employer," he said.

"Old man Ganz? He most likely never noticed I went missing. I could return," Vera argued.

"You misunderstood. I am not _allowing _you to return."

"But—"

Vera stopped short. She still did not feel herself at full strength. She did not want to fight with Eric.

"What did you do there anyways?" he asked, scooping her up in his arms.

Constricted, Vera coughed out, "Writing, copying."

"You can write?"

"Mhmm."

"Read?"

"Yes, but no one knows that."

Eric let her go.

"Funny girl, why would that be a secret?"

"Ganz makes me copy out contracts and legal documents, the confidential sort. He thinks I have no idea what they say. It's easier. Er, it _was_ easier that way. And then. . ."

"What?"

"My family never knew because they left me alone," Vera admitted.

"Your family is gone now," Eric stated rather than asked. He had learned Vera was abandoned before he even started hunting her. It was his reason for picking her. Her beauty made the chase worthwhile; her absent-minded bouts of reflection made it simpler. But it was her solitude that made him embark on it at all.

He was very satisfied with the result, if a little startled. In his earlier plans, she would have been dead already.

Instead, they were loading his coffin on a cart and directing a very frightened driver to their new residence.

"You go on in," Eric said to Vera when they arrived.

She lit a lamp and entered the dark house herself. The light reflected off the marble staircase. She could make out the ornate decorations on the walls by its glow. Everything appeared to be gilded. She heard a thud outside and the creaking of wheels. The cart was leaving. In an instant, Eric had joined her, coffin neatly toted in one arm. Even in the faint light she could see his lips were the bold red of fresh blood.

"The driver?" she asked.

"Dispatched," he replied with a wry smile.

Eric's behavior no longer held much surprise for Vera. She knew what he was, as unreal as it may be. Her grandfather had told her stories of witches and vampires and the ghostly rusalki who haunted the stream by his house in the country. People in the villages were much more superstitious. In the city, there were real terrors and plights. There was no need to imagine them.

Everything felt safe in Vera's new house of gold, though. Eric lit a fire in the master bedroom and sprawled out on the soft duvet. For a creature who had lost all the human habits of sleep, he still enjoyed fine bedding. Vera sat closer to the fire. She looked around. The room seemed odd.

"No windows," Eric said, seeming to have read her mind.

"Oh."

"No windows, no sunlight," he explained.

Curious, Vera asked, "How long has it been since you saw the sun?"

"How long do you think?"

She shrugged.

He scooted off the bed and sat with her by the fire.

"Almost a millennium," he said gravely.

"Do you remember everything you lived through?"

"Not as you would. Certain moments are forgotten, but feelings persist. People's faces fade. My memories turn to instincts, drives. I know how to survive and I get better at it with time. I learn."

"But you lose things."

Eric sighed.

"I suppose. Don't you?"

He began to run his fingers through her hair.

"Do you remember your mother?" she asked.

Eric shook his head.

Vera went silent and pulled abruptly away from him. Eric dropped the strand of hair in his hands.

"My earthly mother died centuries ago. There is no need for me to cling to her or her memory."

"Then you have no sense of where you are from, how you came into being?"

"I did not say that. I said I preserve no recollection of my mother. Someone took her place. One of my own kind," he corrected her.

After a pause, he added, "I could be that for you. I could make your human family disappear."

Vera moved closer to him again.

"I have no desire for a life like yours," she said plainly. "Nor do I wish to forget my family."

Her voice trembled with sadness.

"The pain would subside," Eric said. "We heal quickly and completely."

"From a stake through the heart?" Vera countered with uncommon daring.

"And where did you hear that?"

"Is it true?"

Eric hesitated.

"It is!" she said.

"Yes, well, compared to the many ways you could die, it does not seem like much of a threat," he answered testily.

"You are not invincible," she persisted.

"How long will you live, little human? How much power will you ever have? You will be _dust_," he hissed. "And I will go on. Drinking from the necks of a hundred pretty girls while you turn to ashes."

Eric stood up then.

Vera stared into the fire.

"Why do you love your own mortality?" he asked with anger.

"Because it has an end."

"And what happens after the end?"

"Peace," Vera breathed.

"You are certain?"

"I have faith."

Eric laughed.

"You wish to face the emptiness of death with pride, but every man faces that end scared and alone. I have seen it. There is no peace in that."

"Well, there is no peace in murder, no," she challenged, recalling the unlucky driver.

"Yet that is what you want for yourself."

Vera lowered her head.

"I am tired," she said darkly.

She rose, as if leaving for another room.

He blocked her way and lowered his face to hers.

"If it is death that you truly long for. . ."

Eric bared his fangs.

"I _am _death," he said, a hair's breadth from her lips.

He closed his arms around her lower back and pulled her up to him.

Vera gazed into his cold eyes, now rimmed with red, his blood rising. His fingers found the lacing on her bodice.

"Please," Vera breathed and pressed her lips to his neck.

She had been troubled by dreams of agonizing desire for him. She kissed him as she had wanted, her tongue flicking out to touch the tip of his sharp tooth, inviting him to draw blood.

He undid his shirt with speed and Vera just as quickly freed her arms to embrace him, letting her dress slip to her ankles. Eric slid his hands along her waist to shake off her petticoat. He placed a cold firm hand on her bottom and rammed her closer to him.

It was near dawn, though Eric was not weakened. In the windowless room, with the new duvet dashed to the ground, a few stray feathers floated to the marble floor, unnoticed. Eric guided Vera's pale body onto the mattress under him.

Vera leaned forward. Her forehead against his chest, connected to Eric, she closed her eyes. The brambles of her memory grew faint and all she saw was white.


	6. Chapter 6

"Have you ever been to Paris?" Eric asked.

Vera stifled a yawn and shook her head.

"It is the only city worth seeing at night. Prague is a tomb in comparison."

"I thought you would prefer that," she murmured.

Eric smiled.

"And just what do you think I am?"

Vera let her head fall heavily on his chest.

"My captor," she answered.

She laced her fingers through his.

"My love."

Eric felt the ghostly tug and quickening of his heart. There was no physical reason for such a response. Memory had revived it.

"Is that so?" he teased.

More seriously, he added, "Then you would not object to playing hostess of my house?"

Vera looked up at him in confusion.

He met her gaze with a grin.

Within the week, Eric had made their home the most fashionable salon for the rich and the revolutionary. Somehow, all the disparate groups of intellectual or important individuals gathered to bask in the glow of Eric's gilded rooms, his charm, and the woman on his arm. Vera was the delight of society, though the evenings tried her patience.

She often sat aloof, making her that much more bewitching. Eric nearly forgot about her presence in favor of his other guests—the men he could lure into business deals, the ladies into a private side room. They were always left dazed and inexplicably wounded. But they continued to come back, night after night and Eric lorded over them all.

Vera played her part quietly and obediently. The delicate, destructible waif of a woman beside Eric's tall form made his power seem less alarming to his victims. They would never guess that he was hardly a man at all. Only Vera knew the mystery of his immortality.

"What motivates you?" she asked one night after everyone left. "What makes you want to suffer existence for as long as you have, as long as you will?"

"It is not a sufferance to be granted an endless stretch of time to make love. Or to make money."

"And that's all you need?" Vera said, humorlessly dismissing his answer.

Eric frowned.

"No. . .no, at first, what mattered was the glory of battle. The thrill of conquest and the supremacy of knowing that I could not fall by any man's sword. Then came the pleasures of women and the exciting notion that an eternal pursuit of them would grant me perfection as a lover. Money has only mattered to me very recently. In the past century or so."

"Is it not lonely? The world changes, people die, wave upon wave of people. And you keep standing. Solitary."

"I am not the only one of my kind," Eric replied.

"Yet you do not keep company with them."

"I prefer humans, yes."

He pounced on her and pressed his lips to her.

"So many questions tonight," he said, his voice ragged.

"I simply wonder about you."

Eric pulled away slightly.

"Still?"

"You puzzle me. You trouble me."

"Well, little fairy. . ."

He toyed with a strand of her hair.

"_You_ make me feel weak."

He kissed her again.

"You make _me _feel weak," Vera whispered. "You scorch my veins."

Eric grazed his now-extended fangs along her neck.

On the brink of tears she implored, "My blood _burns_ for you. Tell me you feel the same."

"I do. Fire and love for you. Fire and—"

Vera dug her fingers into his back in distress, until, as Eric lapped at the hot, gushing flow of her blood, her arms lost their strength and draped around his shoulders, holding him close.

When Vera awoke, she left Eric in their bed lying still and death-like. She sat down in the last light of afternoon shining through the windows of the parlor. She closed her eyes to the brilliant warmth. Before Eric, before the parties, before the big feather bed, the daytime was her respite from dark dreams. Now, she rarely saw it. And yet, her world felt brighter.

Her fingers abstractedly rubbed the raw openings on her neck. With Eric, she underwent the ecstasy of death, rising every twilight to greet him again.

He started calling her his wife in public. There was no word for what he was to her, though. At times he was salvation, at time the scourge of God upon her. But she loved him. She loved that he had found her. She forgot the nightmares, the blood—he drained away those memories. He gave her clarity.

Vera did not notice how the sun had set.

Eric's bare feet padded across the floor towards her. He bent down and kissed the top of her head.

"I think we should go to Paris," he said, taking a seat next to her.

She turned to him.

"Can you travel?" she asked.

"Yes, and very rapidly, too," he replied with a cryptic smile.

Vera returned it with one of hesitation.

"Paris?" she echoed, a little in doubt.

"Think of it as a wedding trip."

Vera blushed.

"I have lost any right to a wedding."

"Fine. Then, I absolve you of your sins," he said playfully.

"Do not blaspheme!"

"Or what? I will be struck dead?"

"Or I will be."

"But my fairy does not fear death," he argued, caressing her cheek.

Vera moved to embrace him.

"Will you really take me to Paris?" she asked.

"Of course. The world is much more beautiful beyond this obscure corner. You have to see it."

* * *

**Sorry this update is a little on the short side. More is coming, I promise.**


	7. Chapter 7

A/N: I started my grad school apps! Fingers very very crossed.

* * *

Eric had fulfilled his promise—Paris was everything Vera dreamed and more. The boulevards were wider and the gardens more regal than they were in Prague. She felt as though the world had expanded. From the cramped upper room in the labyrinthine Jewish Quarter and the first nights in Eric's dank cellar, she had somehow found herself on the terrace of a café overlooking the glittering Seine, breathing in the sweet, bright air of early spring.

Their trip across Germany had been unusual, but Vera had never traveled far from home and hardly noticed their peculiar accommodations. It seemed Eric knew several of his kind along the route. One in particular struck Vera, especially in the devoted, deferent way Eric treated him. He was small, stoic, and spoke to Eric in their own old language. He occupied a medieval castle in Hesse, surrounded by a retinue of ghostly servants. When Vera asked about him, Eric was evasive at first.

"He is of special importance to me," he replied. "I would not be what I am now without him."

She pressed the matter further.

Eric finally answered, "He is, you could say, my father."

Accepting that, Vera observed their interactions with fascination. With no one else had she seen Eric so quietly subdue the passion and power that defined his existence. He almost seemed human and Vera loved him more at the sight of such tenderness.

She thought of her own father and his abrupt abandonment of her. She believed it was an irreversible act. Yet, here two undying beings displayed care and concern for each other as though no time had passed, no errors were made, and no offenses given. She wondered if she would find that reconciliation and peace in the life Eric offered. Or would her sadness and anger only deepen as all but she left the world? God would judge them, though she never could.

Vera's intensifying attachment to Eric still had not swayed her in that question of death or life. Instead, she held out without making a choice, drinking every moment dry, avoiding his urgent whispers of an eternity of love, an eternity of his body.

She was glad, at least, upon reaching Paris, that she retained her humanity to see the stained glass of Notre-Dame in the blazing sun. Within the cool shade of those stone walls, with the heady scent of wax and incense wafting in the air, Vera watched the colors splay across the floor like a painting.

She hoped that they would stay in the city long enough for her to see the rose gardens in bloom outside the cathedral. Eric had not said how long they would be there or where they would go next. They had left little of their life behind in Prague. It seemed that Eric was through with that city and she did not protest. It calmed Vera to think of the fresh start they were making. He said that she was his wife; he would keep her with him always. There was to be no more painful solitude, no more dark rooms. Wherever they went would be better than where she had been before. Vera put all her faith in him.

"When you were a child," Eric asked one night, "what did you wish for? For your future?"

Vera sighed.

"My sister, Kamila. It was an impossible wish."

"How?"

Vera gave him a puzzled look.

"She had died," she answered plainly.

Eric's face softened as though he realized something.

"You wanted her to come back?"

Tears welled in her eyes.

"Forgive me," he said. "I have forgotten how much that hurts. I have not. . .lost anyone. In a long time."

Eric brushed a tear from her cheek.

"And yet, what did you dream of for yourself?" he continued. "A nice house? Lots of children?"

Vera blushed.

"What?" Eric asked, smiling at her bashfulness. "You can tell me."

"I wanted to live in the palace."

"In Prague?"

He laughed.

"Queen of Bohemia," he teased. "Empress Vera."

"Stop."

"There is a room in the palace that you would love," Eric said. "Lots of mirrors."

"How do you know?"

"I ransacked it."

Vera looked up at him in surprise.

"You—but that was—"

"Two hundred years ago? Yes. 1648 to be exact. That is how I came from Sweden."

"And now you are in Paris," she said, still marveling at his age. "With me."

Eric kissed her.

"Which is better?" she whispered hastily, boldly.

Eric took her face in his hands.

"You. My darling fairy, you."

He kissed her more deeply. She pulled away just for an instant to ask, "If you had been in Prague for so long, why were you living in that cellar?"

Eric's face darkened.

"I had made a few mistakes."

She waited for him to explain.

With resistance, he said, "I chose the wrong people. Created a mess."

"Oh."

Vera tried to picture it. All she could see was too much blood and bodies lying limp.

"I would have left, started new somewhere else," Eric went on. "It was humiliating to be so abased. But I was determined to regain a position of authority. My pride demanded it. There is no point to my life otherwise. There is no point to being so superior if I cannot enjoy the fruits of power."

"Power is all you crave?"

"Is there something more noble?"

"Compassion and love for others," Vera replied meekly.

"Is that what _you_ seek in life?" he challenged. "You, who are enamored of your loneliness and infatuated with death."

He looked at her more sharply than he had intended.

She ripped herself from his arms.

"It is only because of what is missing in my life," she said pitifully.

"What do you lack? What could possibly be withheld from you? You have _me._"

"What does that mean?"

Eric harshly answered, " You have the opportunity to glut yourself on an infinite existence of inhuman strength and passion. And what? You wish to throw away your own life because a few mortals are no longer with you? Wake up, Vera! I will _always_ be with you."

Eric took hold of her shoulders.

"Does that not mean anything to you?"

Vera refused to meet his gaze.

"Look at me," he demanded.

"Please," he added more softly.

She peered up at him, growing weaker in his grasp.

"Do you love me?" she asked.

"I _want_ you," Eric replied.

"You said you would love me. Do you love me?" Vera persisted.

She began to cry silently as he hesitated.

"I want you for eternity. Understand?" he finally said.

"So you will desire me and need me. And when you meet someone else, what then? You may still want me, but only love would keep you faithful, only love would be enough for me. Why should I want to hear you say these same words to some other woman, over and over, year after year?"

"What other women? You _are_ the only one!" he argued.

"Now I am, yes. But forever? In my heart I know that that all my love will only ever belong to you. What is in your heart?"

"Your blood! You! You are," Eric shouted.

"And in a century?" Vera asked, trembling.

"Why must you do this?" he replied despondently. "You say your love is mine, but you refuse me. I offer to be with you in a way that no human could and you reject me. You love me, you say. But you do not want me. Not like I want you. You are afraid of what I offer. And you hide behind _love_ and your petty human reverence for it. What makes it so righteous?"

Vera collapsed on the floor.

"Hysterical woman," Eric hissed.

He was about to reach down to comfort her, but he stopped short, as though his pride prevented him.

"I am going out," he said.

"No, please. I am sorry," she sobbed.

He slipped his arms through his coat, took one last look at her, and left.

"I love you, I love you," Vera moaned again and again until, exhausted and hoarse, she faded into sleep.

She vaguely heard Eric's entry in a few hours time, but not enough to notice the second pair of footsteps.

* * *

**Had to look up some Thirty Years' War history for this one. Battle of Prague 1648. Swedes looted the castle. Also, I've been compulsively avoiding contractions in this story. Does it sound weird?  
**


	8. Chapter 8

A/N: I gave myself the luxury of writing this after a long, sucky day when I really should have just turned off the light and gone to bed. Tell me what you think.

* * *

Vera rose groggily from the floor where she had fallen into a troubled sleep. She heard Eric's voice in another room, mingled with the flat tones of a woman coyly protesting.

"And what makes you think you can have your way with me?" Vera heard her say.

She gathered her courage and pushed the door open. Eric stood shirtless before a naked woman. He pulled the pins out of her hair and let it fall to her breast.

"You came here with me," he said, running his finger along her jawline.

Vera stepped into the room and stuttered, "What—what are you doing?"

Eric turned to her and gave her black look.

The air crackled as he flew to close and lock the door behind her. He kissed her neck and whispered, "You will be sorry…"

He slipped the key in his pocket then went back to the other woman, whom he led to the embroidered sofa.

Vera stood in horror. She shut her eyes and turned to face the wall. She was trapped.

"Come now, little fairy, you are not going to watch?" Eric taunted.

"I hate you," Vera spat, her back still towards him.

"What does _she _have to do with it?" the other woman asked. "Take your pants off already."

"Not so fast. Tell me: how would you like a chance at everlasting youth and power?"

The woman laughed.

"Is that what making love to you is like?" she asked.

"Hm, what do you think, Vera? Is that what it is like?"

She refused to respond.

"No," Eric answered the woman. "No, it has nothing to do with that."

He brandished his fangs.

The woman gasped.

"Do you want it?" he growled.

As though in a trance, the woman nodded her head.

With one swift movement, his mouth was on her throat. She cried aloud and Vera turned.

Eric had not meant to make her watch him with another woman. He wanted her to see him give to someone else what he wished to give to her.

"No! No, please, Eric!" Vera wailed.

She tugged at his arms then yanked his hair, trying with all her strength to pull him off the woman who was now moaning in pleasure.

But he did not budge.

"I beg you! You can do it to me, do you hear me? I will let you!"

Vera threw herself on him, wrapping her arms around his waist, pressing her lips to the bare skin of his back, but Eric kept draining the woman. She soon grew quiet and still. Eric lifted his head.

Vera grabbed his face, smearing the blood from his mouth on his cheeks, staining her own hands.

She forced him to meet her gaze.

"Please, please no. Eric, I will do whatever you say. I will!"

"So you would rather I simply murdered her?"

Vera faltered.

"Must you?"

"It is up to you."

"Do not make me the judge of life and death!"

"Why not? I am such a judge. We all are."

Vera backed away. Eric stood up to follow her.

"Shall I choose for you?" he asked.

"All I want is you," Vera replied. "That is all I want from this world."

"So we should let her die. Then you and I can live forever. Alone. Together."

Vera bit her lip.

"Say the word, my fairy," he prompted tenderly, hunching to bring his face closer to hers. "Say it and I will love only you as long as we live."

She looked at the deep, dark stains on the beautiful needlework of the sofa, now tainted with death, and heard in fear his hollow promise of love once more.

"No!" she snapped.

"No, no no," she kept muttering.

Eric stood up to his full height.

He stormed over to the other woman, ripped the skin off his wrist and pressed it to her mouth, while Vera crouched in the corner, silently shivering.

***

Vera spent all the sunlit hours of the following days wandering Paris. She made a point of returning just as night was falling so she could lock herself in the spare bedroom before Eric arose. She would start a fire, watch the sun set, crawl under the covers, and try not to think.

When she arrived home one night, however, Vera saw that the drapes were drawn.

Curious, she went to open them.

"Please, do not," Eric's voice said behind her.

She hesitated for a moment, thinking of the pain it would cause him should she pull back the shade to let the last rays of sun in. Even after everything, though, she could not bring herself to do it.

Instead, she said, "You are up early."

"I had to speak with you."

Vera kept her eyes on the floor as he approached her.

"Pam will need to feed, so I must leave when she awakes," he explained.

"Pam," Vera echoed.

"Yes."

"How nice."

"Vera…"

She looked up at him.

They stared at each other in silence.

Eric reached down to take her hand. She snatched it away.

"Say something," he urged.

Vera remained mute.

Red tears gathered in Eric's eyes.

"I only wanted to show you," he said, trailing off.

"Yes. You have made a wonderful spectacle of it all," she replied coldly.

He fell to his knees.

"Tiny, precious fairy, you forgive me?"

"Forgive?" she repeated, surprised.

Eric gave her a hopeful look.

Vera stepped forward, placed her delicate hand on his shoulder and said quietly, "It is all over."

He threw his arms around her, lifting her up as he stood, kissing her passionately.

"Only you, I swear…only you," he murmured as he kissed her neck.

"My heart," she breathed.

He took her to the bed.

"It is over," she sighed, though Eric did not hear.

She let him run his hands along the length of her body without flinching.

He closed his eyes when his thumb came to the beating artery at the top of her thigh. His fangs appeared and Vera looked upon them as she would a knife.

He moved to enter her and she turned her head away.

The door slammed open and Pam, her hands on her hips, announced, "I am famished."

Eric groaned.

"You will never survive, if you do not learn patience!" he shouted.

Vera scrambled under the sheets as Eric stood up, unabashed.

Pam looked at Vera and licked her lips.

"Get out," Eric barked.

She eyed him up and down and arched her brow.

"Now!"

Pam left the room, sulking.

When Eric turned around, Vera was standing by the bed wrapped in a sheet, shaking.

"Sorry," he grumbled. "What—are you all right?"

She blinked at him without answering.

"Are you angry?" he asked.

"No."

"But you are upset?" he guessed.

"No," she lied.

He kissed her tenderly on the cheek.

"Good. Wait for me till I come back."

* * *

**Not quite the book's version of Pam's backstory, but it kinda fits, right?**


	9. Chapter 9

A/N: Final chapter. I just wanted to make sure, beloved readers, that you caught the heavy foreshadowing in this story's tagline. If not, you may be really disappointed……….here goes…

* * *

Hoping to restore himself in Vera's sight, Eric arranged for a decadent meal to be laid out in the never-used dining room of their apartments.

She came home to the scent of warm bread. The room was ablaze with candles and Eric sat at the head of the table, waiting for her.

Vera cautiously took the seat that he offered her.

"Please," he said, gesturing for her to fill her plate.

She gave him a smile for the first time in days.

Pam stomped into the room and draped herself on a chair. Eric looked at her sharply.

"Eugh, how can you find any of this appetizing?"

Vera's bright smile faded and she pushed the plate away from her.

"I am not going to eat before an audience," she said gloomily.

"Would you like to be _eaten_ before an audience?" Pam asked.

"Get out!" Eric commanded.

She had to obey, but took her time leaving.

Finally, Eric was alone with Vera again and tried to coax her into enjoying the meal.

"This cannot go on," she said. "We cannot go on. Not with her."

"I will send her away," Eric replied.

Thinking, he added eagerly, "I will send her to Godric in Germany. You never have to see her again."

"But she exists," Vera argued.

"Existence is a curious thing. The immediate physical reality of something is the only proof."

"So, what then? Out of sight, out of mind?"

"Yes! If she goes away, we can forget her. We can go back to the way it was before."

"I do not believe forgetting is possible. You _made _her."

Eric squared his jaw. He could not say anything to challenge the truth of that.

"Well, little fairy, what precisely do you want me to do?"

"Nothing."

He stood up from the table angrily.

"I told you I would make it better and you want 'nothing.' It is always 'nothing' I hear from you. You have made your life about giving up!"

"I do not have your inhuman strength," Vera replied, stressing the word inhuman.

"I refuse to have another conversation like this."

Vera sighed and stood to leave the room. Eric grabbed her arm.

In a fierce whisper, he said, "Ever since that first taste, I have only ever wanted you. Do you understand? You. A human. Mere prey, my means of survival. But it was you who was using me. All you wanted was for me to take your life out of your hands. You wanted me to expedite your demise and then demanded _love_ from me as though I was capable of giving it. But I wonder now, what did you really feel?"

Vera's lip quivered. Eric was inches from her face.

"It will end as it began," she replied.

Puzzled, Eric stepped back, but Vera reached out, put a hand around his neck and kissed him.

"I do love you," she said.

"So what happens next?" he asked.

"You go out into the night and I turn to my bed."

"And tomorrow?"

Giving no response, Vera kissed Eric with a sense of finality.

He grinned.

"Sleep well and dream of me."

She pressed her lips to his hand and let him leave.

"Pam!" Eric called out in the other room. "We are going!"

The next evening when he rose, Eric found Vera in bed. He did not know if it was the end or the beginning of rest for her and did not dare to wake her.

Instead, he wrote a note. Pam looked over his shoulder.

"I thought you said you picked her up on the street. Can she even read?"

Eric glared at her and covered the paper with his hand so she could not see it.

He set the note on the dresser, placed a delicate kiss on her forehead, and whispered a farewell.

"You make a pathetic vampire," Pam needled.

"You will regret saying that," he answered darkly.

Vera had not truly been asleep. She sat up when she was sure they had left. She walked over and picked up Eric's note.

_My dear wife and fairy,_

_I am sending Pam to Godric and we are going to move on to London. I have made all the arrangements. Paris will be a memory. _

_I love you._

_I am yours,_

_Eric_

Vera ran her finger over the words he had underlined boldly.

She sat at the writing desk and pulled out supplies to pen a reply. In one of the drawers, she found an old paper knife. It was rusted, but the handle was made of ivory. She set it next to the inkwell.

_Eric – you were to be my Redeemer. You would have taken my life and set me free. But you made me give my heart to you. How could I not? Now it will be yours for all the days you walk this earth, though I am gone. Will you remember me? I hope you do. Take care of the heart I leave behind. It beats with love only for you._

_Vera_

She pressed a sheet of blotting paper over it and placed it gingerly aside. From the deep pocket of her skirt, she pulled out a vial.

It had been her errand that day and was finally found in an apothecary in Montmartre. Laudanum—she would sleep forever.

Vera squared herself in the chair and took a deep breath as she plucked out the cork.

Her heart raced.

She raised the bottle to her lips, froze, and set it down again. She began crying, burying her head in her hands on the desk. Something grazed her smallest finger. Through her tears, she saw the knife.

She picked it up and held it in a shaking hand. She grazed it along the tip of her index finger and a spot of red appeared.

There was only one way she could die. Eric had made it so.

***

At a table in the darkest corner of a bar, Eric and Pam staked out their night's meal.

"He looks delicious," Pam noted, pointing to a young man having his first drink.

"Fool, he came with someone."

Eric tilted his head in the direction of a stuffy man who appeared to be the boy's father.

"Fine, you can have him."

"I am not hungry. And I would not take him even if I was starving."

Pam noticed how the man coughed.

"Could his blood make you ill?"

"No, but it would not make me well."

"Oh," Pam said, sitting back a little, losing some of her affected confidence.

Suddenly, Eric grabbed his chest. His head snapped up, his eyes grew wide, and before Pam could understand what was happening, he tore out of the bar.

He broke down the door and skidded to a stop at the sight of Vera slumped in the chair at the writing desk.

He sensed the blood before he saw it. Dark pools spread across the marble at her feet. Eric could not control his fangs.

He swung the chair around to face her. She was white.

"No!"

He picked up one limp arm and then the other. He brought his face close to her neck. There was no pulse.

Without a second thought, he bit into his own wrist, and frantically held it over her lips. His blood poured down her chin. He shouted in exasperation.

"Vera…" he cried.

Desperate, he wilted to the floor.

He took her stained left hand and kissed the wound. Her blood tasted like the rusty blade, but his tongue traced the line of her finger with terrifying devotion. He had loved her. She was his.

Now she was empty. He was empty.

***

"I do not love humans," Eric said grimly.

"You know she's not entirely human," his queen argued. "My guess is fairy."

He gave her a sharp look.

"I take it you find fairies as irresistible as the rest of us?"

"Only one."

"Only Sookie?" she teased. "Well, have fun dealing with William Compton."

Eric hardly cared what Bill felt. For a hundred years, Eric had found nothing in the frailty of human form but sustenance and meaningless pleasure. They were a resource to exploit. Only when a woman, forbidden to him by her bond with another and strangely beyond nature, had stumbled into his territory did he perceive that old desire reawaken. He sought Sookie with determination and ardent curiosity, if only to find again the way Vera had made him feel. Yet, he knew, Sookie could never be what he lost. Vera was his wife through the millennia of his life. More cherished than his earthly bride, Eric's morbid little fairy was his most painfully pleasant memory, his first cut.

* * *

**Much thanks to everyone who read, reviewed, and enjoyed this story. If you're interested in more of my writing, I have a website: readmaura dot com. (the link is on my profile!)**


End file.
